In the Dark
by Flawed-Jade
Summary: Darkness is his cover, his ally, and his enemy. Terry McGinnis must comes to terms with how the life of Batman also affects the life of Terry.
1. Default Chapter

In the Dark (Ch. 1)  
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Hi all. My first Batman Beyond fic. Criticism is welcomed because I'm still trying to get a handle on how to write a good action scene. The chapter is kinda long by my standards, but I hope it's not boring.  
Ummm... I was trying to get in deeper here. See if you can pick up all the different meanings of dark and Dark in the story.  
  
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I didn't notice anymore. It seems completely, entirely natural... that's what worries me.  
  
"Terry!"  
  
Mom was standing in the doorway to my room with folded laundry nestled in her arms and the light from the hall silhouetted her form.  
  
"How many times do I need to tell you? If you're working in here, turn the lights on."  
  
A tap from her on the light switch and I had to shield my eyes from the sudden flood of brightness.  
  
"Honestly, you'll ruin your eyes someday honey."  
  
My eyes were the least of my concerns at the moment. But still, how long have I been doing this?  
  
Reading in the dark, thinking in the dark, brooding in the dark, stalking in the dark, fighting in the dark, sleeping... actually I don't get too much sleep anymore.  
  
But I'm not just living in the dark. I'm living in the Dark.  
  
Some time ago, I was perusing through some of the old microfilm of newspaper clippings in the Batcave. Can you believe they used to call him the "Dark Knight?" Retro huh?  
  
But it fits. The more I think about, the more it seems to fit.  
  
It's a Dark world... very Dark...  
  
-------------------  
  
****Next Night****  
  
"McGinnis! Pick up the pace and get over to the East side!" He yelled in my earpiece with his usual grumpy, old geezer attitude.  
  
"Tell that to the Batmobile."  
  
The ride wasn't feeling very smooth. It glided at an uneven hover, and seemed to be dragging a bit. I was feeling bad enough about what happened already. I didn't need any lip from Wayne right now.  
  
I admit they caught me off guard. Jokers. A swarm of them ambushed me in the alley. They just appeared out of the shadows, in the dark, on my turf.  
  
They charged, one after another after another, then two at once.  
  
I tossed two of them into the dumpster and suddenly a chain whipped around my throat from behind, snaring me. I grabbed a hold of the chain and pulled to give my neck some slack. Then I leaned forward toward him and fired up the jets in my boots. Going from rest to 50 mph in under a second, I slammed into him and ended up sandwiching his fractured ribcage between my Batsuit and a solid brick wall. The chain loosened when the other end dropped from his limp hands and I gulped in a few breaths of fresh air before I was tackled from behind. Then, charged knuckle-spikes seared against my head.  
  
We pummeled, thrashed and trashed.  
  
By the time it ended, five of them laid unconscious, the rest had scrambled or scampered away, and I was left with a gaping knife tear through the circuitry of my Batsuit.  
  
I stood there for a moment, trying to calm my nerves. Rumbling with the Jokers does this to me sometimes. Enrages me, infuriates me, and infects me with their own blind insanity.  
  
"Silent alarm along McJenson Jewelers. East end."  
  
I took note of his order. "Can I have a moment first?"  
  
"You can have all the moments you want when you're off duty, but this is my time and you have work to do."  
  
Yeah I'm fine, thanks for your concern. I made my way back to the Batmobile, but nearly stopped cold when I saw it.  
  
"Slagged!"  
  
"I beg your pardon, Terry?"  
  
I stared in disbelief as I felt my anger rising and the bile boiling in the pit of my gut. My hand naturally went to my head, wanting to embed them in my hair and have something to grip, but it only met with the smooth surface of my mask. "Just turn on your vid-link Wayne. Look at what the freaking Jokers did to the car!"  
  
I guess that brawl was just a distraction while they played their little practical joke.  
  
Wayne sounded surprised. Disturbed and surprised. "It's..."  
  
"I know. Hot pink." The signature grinning Joker mouth was painted across the hood, and the rest of the car was... "It's hot, freaking, magenta pink."  
  
Wayne did a diagnostic scan on the machinery and nothing further seemed to be wrong with it other than the obscene paintjob. But I've been behind the wheels for long enough to know when something didn't feel right, and right now my Bat-senses were going off in my head.  
  
"Are you sure there's nothing wrong with the engine?" I asked as I thrust the acceleration into a higher gear. Why did the situation seem so familiar all of a sudden?  
  
"I don't see anything out of the ordinary. But you know, it looks like they used high-density gesso-based paint."  
  
"Meaning?"  
  
"Meaning it's not going come off easily. Might take 3 or 4 days of high-temperature and pressurized treatment."  
  
"Out of commission for that long? Do I smell vacation time in the future?" Of course I knew the answer to my question, but I like messing with the old man sometimes, even if he does tend to overreact.  
  
"No, you smell yourself going on patrol sans the car."  
  
"Figures. What about the suit?"  
  
"The tear isn't too bad. You should be able to function for the rest of the night if you don't overcharged the main electromagnetic components. In other words, stay away from electricity and water."  
  
I made a sharp right turn and was suddenly aware of the sluggishness of the car again. Something was wrong. And that wasn't even the most disturbing thing. The black Batmobile was designed to blend into the night, utilizing the dark. Now it's a crying-out-loud pink and I painfully aware of how exposed I was to enemies. Whoever broke into the jeweler would see me coming a mile away.  
  
You know, it bothers me. How did the Jokers get so smart all of a sudden? A planned attack? A planned distraction? They're using high-density whatever paint so I practically glow like a beacon?  
  
"There they are!" I broke off the rest of my thought when I saw three figures soaring over the rooftops in the distance.  
  
Looked like the Royal Flush Gang, now consisting only of King, Queen and the Ace, was making a hasty escape. The hover boards were taking them over the towering skyline of Gotham. They were a little too easy to spot. Maybe I'm just getting paranoid.  
  
"I'm leaving the car and going on foot," I told him. "Better chance of catching them off guard."  
  
"I was sure the smiling pink car would catch them off guard."  
  
"I meant I needed to sneak up on them."  
  
The hatch on the Batmobile slid open with a whisper and I stood up. The thin, red glider wings unsheathe from under my arms, and then I plunged into the cool night air again.  
  
Moments later, perched on a rooftop I caught the gang in my sights again. I won't deny it. It felt good to be in the shadows, in the dark, and not in pink. I was the watcher again, slinking through the night, and utilizing my advantage.  
  
I snapped out two Bat-a-rangs and zoomed in on my targets. Arching my arms back, I readied my wrists to fling them forward.  
  
Suddenly, something wrapped around my arms from behind, and forcefully yanked me fully into the air. My body went flying, but before I could even try to break free, I was slammed back-first into the roof. The concrete splintered under me upon impact.  
  
No allowing myself time to even groan in response, I pried myself off the ground and propelled myself aside just in time to dodge an arched, black tentacle as it spiked into the stone rubble.  
  
"Oh, come on now. This can be done so much faster if you would just stay still."  
  
The black tentacle retracted and her form reshaped before me.  
  
"Inque?"  
  
She cackled just as she lashed back at me again. I found myself running for dear life, springing from one spot to the next non-stop just to avoid getting flattened by her flailing, metamorphic limbs. Jumped from the roof to the edge, sprang off from the edge to a wall, pushed off from the wall to a window sill, swung off from the window sill to the rail of balcony. She was right behind me smashing through brick, pounding into metal, crushing into cement, and piercing through reinforced concrete like it was tissue paper.  
  
All the while, I regrouped my thoughts and the truth seemed to appear. Inque pulled an old trick on me. The reason the car was dragging was she hitchhiking on the back, exactly like the time she snuck into the Batcave. If I hadn't been so distracted over the hideous color of the car, I might have remembered it.  
  
"Terry! Terry! Is everything okay?" Wayne's voice was barely audible as Inque tore through a billboard, screaming after me.  
  
"It's Inque. She's..."  
  
I flung one of the Electro-pulse Bat-a-rangs at her. She caught it in mid-flight and showed no sign of even flinching as the electric current surged through her. I cursed silently when she turned my weapon back on me and almost embedded it into my skull.  
  
She laughed again. "Didn't expect THAT did you Batman?"  
  
I guess I didn't.  
  
Just then I felt like a bolt of lightening struck me. The electricity crackled around my limbs, and surged through the rip on the suit before I understood that I had been attack from behind.  
  
It was the Royal Flush Gang, coming in to close the door on the trap. The King tapped his scepter blaster on his palm and sneered, "How about this Batman? Did you expect this?"  
  
Well, I guess did expect that either. Glad everyone's suddenly interested in surprising me.  
  
I didn't expect it either when heard the wild war whoop of Jokers close in around me. Everything that happened that night made sense now. The attacks, the distractions, the decoys... everything. Well, I guess the whole gang's here now. Everyone who did the planning is now here for the party.  
  
"Terry, get out of here. Get out of there now!"  
  
Wayne didn't have to tell me twice. I know when the odds are stacked against me, and I know when the odds are about to crush me like a bug.  
  
My hands flew to my belt and switched on the camouflage mode.  
  
"Don't let him get away you fools."  
  
I vanished from their sights, but I knew I had to move quick before Ace detected me with his infrared heat scan. But that chance never came. Inque, suddenly threw herself out in my direction, spreading her liquid body like a wide web and splattering every which way.  
  
"I got him!"  
  
She had splashed on my transparent suit and discovered my location. With lightening speed, she gathered herself and completely encased me in her fluid form, outlining exactly where I was for the world to see.  
  
The King fired at me, directing the electric pulse square at the torn opening in my suit. The surge sizzled through the circuitry.  
  
  
"McGinnis! Mc..."  
  
Wayne's transmission died off. The suit itself lost all power and I collapsed onto the ground. It wouldn't let me move anymore. The suit was dead, and in a minute I have a feeling I might be too.  
  
The last time I saw was the Ace walking over to me. Next his foot flew toward my head.  
  
Then, I was in the dark again.  



	2. Ch. 2

In the Dark - Ch. 2  
  
Warning - not editted, 'cause I'm lazy like that. Thanks so much for the feedback. I'm an incredibly insecure writer, so every constructive or positive comment helps.  
  
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The darkness receded slowly.  
  
Waking up was a battle in of itself. My lips were parched, and my head felt like it had acquired a permanent dent in my left cranium.  
  
The blackness of unconsciousness first softened its hold, and then suddenly a white painted face pierced through the shadowy haze.  
  
"Wake up, you dog."  
  
My head jarred violently to the side from a blow and though I still couldn't see clearly the obvious guess was that Queen just tried to bash my skull in with something hard.  
  
"Queen, ease up!" An annoyed female voice spoke up from somewhere beyond the Royal Flush Queen.  
  
I blinked hard a few times to clear my vision and saw a black, fluid form shape into a human body.  
  
"If anyone gets first smack at the Bat, it's me."  
  
Inque's black form slithered forward like a solid shadow.  
  
Instinctively, I tried to reach for a Bat-a-rang. No use, of course. The suit was out of action and out of power, so at that point I was really no more than a statue with sensitive pain receptors.  
  
"What's wrong Inque?" I tried to distract her with some banter. "Too weak to take me on your own? Had to team up with these losers? The Royal Flush Gang? The Jokers? Who's next, your grandma?"  
  
"Oh yes, your hide and that loathsome tongue is definitely worth 'teaming up with losers.'"  
  
With a swift convulsion of her body, one of Inque's limbs shaped into a mallet. A really, really big mallet.  
  
Staring straight at me, the eerily haunting words slithered through the silence the same way that she glided across the floor. "I've been waiting a long time for this Batman."  
  
She raised her mallet arm back, winding for the strike. "A long, long time."  
  
Then there was a sudden burst of pain against my head.  
  
Everything was dark again.  
  
------------------  
  
"Were you ever afraid of the dark as a child?"  
  
Wayne once asked me that during my night patrol of the city. Standing there high atop the Gotham power plant I was speechless for a moment. I guess I shouldn't have felt too bad about my reaction, considering his query came entirely from out of the blue. But being in Batman-mode makes me impose certain expectations on myself. I should be faster, smarter, more alert, more perceptive. I should have been able to respond sooner.  
  
"Well yeah, I guess I was," I answered hesitantly into the mic in my headpiece.  
  
"Did you ever have a night light?"  
  
Again there was that stunned flash in my brain. And after a moment...  
  
"First of all, night lights were before my time, old man. Our generation had the lumin-orbs."  
  
"Oh, my mistake." I could hear the sarcasm in his tone. "Well McGinnis, did you have one?"  
  
Pause. I wasn't exactly eager to give him the information.  
  
"Yes I did." He creeps me out a bit sometimes. How would he know something like that? Why would it even occur to him to ask? "You want to know what type of diapers I wore too?"  
  
"Are you sure diapers weren't before your time too?"  
  
"That's cute Wayne," I answered dryly.  
  
Then I took a minute and zoomed in my night vision to peruse the Southern downtown district. Nothing was happening. It was a quite night I guess.  
  
I broke the silence a few moments later. "Hey Mr. Wayne. Why did you ask me that anyway? About the dark and everything." Is he going to hold it against me? Does he think I'm less qualified to be Batman now?  
  
"I wasn't really asking. More like I was affirming my suspicions."  
  
What the heck was that supposed to mean?  
  
"What the heck is that supposed to mean?" I hope he didn't take that the wrong way. It came out of my mouth before I could adjust the attitude level.  
  
"You show it in the way you interact with the night Terry. You have a healthy relationship with darkness." It sounded like it could have been a Wayne wisecrack, except there was no caustic or sardonic tone. "It's nothing to be ashamed of. Childhood fear of the dark grows into a respect for everything that happens at night."  
  
"Uhhh right... So what about the lumin-orb or the night light?"  
  
"I could tell because you don't settle for blindness in the darkness. Others let the darkness mask their fears for false security. You would rather have the light and see your enemies face to face. That's why night after night you see more details from rooftops than most people do on danger's own level. You make yourself face the horrors that most people choose to shield themselves from."  
  
For the third time that night I was again at a loss for words. Granted, he didn't even ask me a question that time, but I still felt like I needed to respond to that somehow.  
  
"Was that a compliment Wayne? You'll spoil me yet."  
  
"Don't get used to it McGinnis."  
  
-------------------  
  
The dream, the memory, dissolved before my eyes. And I awoke to the most frightening situation I could face at that moment. I was strapped to something. The wind resistance against my body and the mechanical rumbling beneath me told me it was a vehicle. A moving vehicle going high speed.  
  
My head. I wanted to clutch it and rub the stabbing pain away. I wanted to rub my eyes and clear away the haze. I can't even see clearly anymore. It was like looking through gauze, or viewing the world through a 20th century TV with bad reception. I could feel heat of the sun through my suit so I knew it was day, but the dark swirls before my eyes suggested the darkness of night.  
  
When are they going to stop hitting me in the head?  
  
Then I heard the unmistakable sound of hover-cycles beside me. Jokers. A pack of them. The vehicle under me took a sudden dive. The abrupt vertical turn made my stomach lurch.  
  
I swallowed. I was strapped to the Batmobile. No other hovercraft could do a straight drop with such terrifying ease. The Jokers were behind my wheels and messing with me.  
  
"Hey Bats! How do you like this?"  
  
I couldn't see who was yelling at me. One of the Joker pack. I blinked hard. No good. My vision was not clearing.  
  
Under me, the Batmobile swooped from the down motion into a smooth horizontal glide. Just then I realized I had been holding my breath, and willed myself to breath again. It was terrifying not being able to see and anticipate what might come next.  
  
I needed to fight, but I couldn't move, and I could barely see.  
  
Just then, I heard the Batmobile hatch slide open behind me.  
  
"This has been fun Batman, and it's a shame we have to total these wheels." I recognized the voice. Spike? Freddie? One of the leaders. "Say hi to City Hall for me."  
  
What was he talking about? What was going on?  
  
Suddenly one of the hover-bikes roared up close. Then I felt the side of the Batmobile dip down a bit before bouncing back up. I realized he had jumped from the vehicle and onto the hover-bike.  
  
He had jumped ship and left the Batmobile moving on auto-pilot. Why?  
  
I blinked hard and through my already dimmed vision, I saw the vague outline of a building getting closer.  
  
City Hall, I was about to crash head first into City Hall.  
  
I bit down hard, trying to brace myself for an impact that would most likely kill me.  
  
But as if a miracle had been issue from some heavenly place, I felt the Batmobile starting to decelerate. It was slowing down.  
  
Slowing, but not slowing fast enough. Inertia itself worked against me and we slammed into a brick surface, breaking through a layer of wall and finally coming to a painful stop.  
  
Once again, my head had gotten the brunt of the damage. Before I could finish groaning, the Batmobile backed out of the wreckage. As the vehicle ascended into a higher altitude and began gliding away, I found that I couldn't sustain consciousness anymore. I drifted off into darkness again.  
  
-------------------------  
  
I'll have more later about what the Brady Bunch of villians are doing. Plus an explanation of what just happened to save Terry there. 


	3. Ch. 3

In the Dark (Ch. 3)  
  
I groaned. At least I think I did.  
  
My head hurt. Well, everything hurt, but my head seemed to hurt more than anything else. I keep telling myself that I should open my eyes, figure out what's going on. I should open my eyes. But I can't. For whatever reason, I can't. There was still only darkness.  
  
Someone was removing my mask, but I was too weak to fight it.  
  
"Relax Terry. It's me."  
  
I slumped back in relief when I recognized Wayne's voice.  
  
"What happened?"  
  
"Don't try too hard to think right now. Your head took a lot of trauma, you're probably feeling dizzy."  
  
Dizzy didn't seem like the right word for it. Dizzy must be the little brother to what I'm feeling right now. I would have told him, but I couldn't quite get my thoughts together for the right statement.  
  
He was bandaging my head. I could tell because I felt gausse wrapping around my forehead.  
  
"McGinnis, that crash would have killed you if you hit the building at full speed strapped to the Batmobile's hood like that."  
  
I hear a snipping sound. He must be cutting the bandages.  
  
"Why didn't it?" I think I groaned again.  
  
"I slowed it down."  
  
"... you... but how?" Don't tell me Wayne has super Bat-powers or something now.  
  
"Remember the last time I recalibrated the Batmobile's rotational hover gears? I wired in partner controls to the Batmobile from the cave."  
  
"Oh... don't trust my driving anymore huh?"  
  
Something stung the wound on my chest. He must be treating it with that herbal concoction again.  
  
"Well, that was the week you crashed the Batmobile twice. Remember?"  
  
"... 'Crash' is such an ugly word."  
  
"Besides, they're only partner controls. The master controls override my commands." He paused, voice and actions, verbally and motionally. "That's why I couldn't..."  
  
Why he couldn't help me sooner before I crashed. But he still saved me and managed to manuevered the Batmobile back to the Batcave. "Well, I should have been able to take care of myself," I answered. "I shouldn't have been in that position to begin with."  
  
For a long moment I didn't hear anything from him. I couldn't sense any movement from him. In fact, in the midst of the darkness, I felt completely alone.  
  
I tried to open my eyes again. But there was only the dark.  
  
"Wayne? Wayne, where are you?"  
  
"I'm right here Terry, right in front of you." I was surprised by the sudden closeness of his voice. He sounded concerned. "Terry, you're looking straight at me."  
  
"I don't see you!" I frantically touched at my face. He was right. My eyes were already open. No. No! This can't be happening...  
  
"I'm blind."  
  
I'm in the dark.  
-------------------------  
  
The world whirred by.  
  
I felt strong arms lift me into a back hover-car seat.  
  
I heard the hubbub of late night sky traffic.  
  
I smelled a sterile scent safting through a cold corridor.  
  
I tasted the dry medicine air.  
  
I never saw anything, but I knew Wayne had carted me off to Central Gotham Hospital. Evertyhing seems more urgent and frantic in the darkness.  
  
Expert hands examined my head, studied the bruises, pries open my eyelids to check for corneal damage.  
  
I heard a jumbled mess of medical jargan.  
  
Head trauma. Possible concussion. Damage to the photoreceptor neurons.  
  
"They say the blindness is probably temporary." The room finally stopped spinning when I heard Wayne's voice. I hadn't even realized that the doctor had already left.  
  
"Probably?" I snorted, knowing full-well that self-pity colored my words.  
  
"If short-term, you'll get your sight back in a week. If long-term, maybe in 2 years."  
  
I sat silent, leaning against a lumpy pillow, head still pounding a dull, distant throb.  
  
Earlier, Commissioner Gordon had come down personally to get my statement. The official story was that I was running a late-night errand for Mr. Wyane when I got ambushed by the Jokers. Close enough to the truth even if it's not the whole truth. There was a knowing, non-questioning tone in the ex-Batgirl's voice as she closed her electronic recording pad with a faint click.  
  
"Tough break kid, but I'm sure you did your best."  
  
"Commissioner?"  
  
"Yes, Terry?" Hissing of fabric told me that she was putting on her coat and getting ready to leave.  
  
"What made you end your bat-career?"  
  
She thought for a while, indicating that the full answer was probably more complicated than what she was about to tell me.  
  
"I guess it was a combination of a desire to move on to bigger things and a pretty severe injury." She paused. "It happens to the best of us, right Bruce?"  
  
I didn't here Wayne answer, but could imagine his grim, silent stare.  
  
Now with the two of us alone in the eerie hospital stillness, I asked him the one question that had plagued me ever since I discovered my loss of sight.  
  
"So, I guess you'll be needing a new ... 'errand boy'?" No use avoding it. The issue was going to come up sooner or later. Probably sooner since Inque, the Royal Flush Gang and the Jokers were about to start reeking havoc on the city any minute now. Batman would be needed, whether or not Terry McGinnis still has any part in it.  
  
Somewhere inside me, a hollowness was spreading through the deepest part of my soul. Just then I understood why Wayne always seemed so embittered. And I knew why he looks at me with nostalgic envy as I glide through the air in the jet-powered suit.  
  
That used to be him.  
  
The Bat. The Dark Knight. I feel it too now. Once you've become Batman, you'll never feel alive as anything else. You serve and protect. You're needed. You feel like your life has some greater value. Things that used to give you nightmares now fuel and drive you, pushing you to your best and worst.  
  
And when you're no longer able to serve physically, there's still this little bit of internal Bat that can't be removed. If you try to tear it out of you you'll eventually rip up everything inside. Because that Bat awareness is ultimately connected to every part of your being.  
  
"What makes you think you're getting a vacation?" His grumpy voice answered from the silence.  
  
I sat up straighter in the bed. "What?"  
  
"It's not like you lost an arm, Terry. You have a job to do and the city needs you."  
  
His voice was gruff even as he said that. But at that moment I could have been blind, deaf... and completely paralyzed and I would have still felt invincible.  
  
I am blind. I am in the dark. But I am the Dark Knight.  
  
"You know what Terry?"  
  
"What?"  
  
"Bats fly blind anyway." 


End file.
